


and i've been meaning to tell you

by returntosaturn



Category: Schitt's Creek
Genre: Fluff, Husbands, I mean look, M/M, Marriage, Patrick is a TS fan, Slice of Life, that's the fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-08
Updated: 2020-08-08
Packaged: 2021-03-05 22:42:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,501
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25793062
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/returntosaturn/pseuds/returntosaturn
Summary: “It's just that I’m trying to reconcile the fact that I never knew this about my husband until he was already my husband, and it's just… shocking. For you. And interesting. And... cute.” David twists his hands, voice getting smaller and smaller as he ticks off adjectives.// After interviewing a new employee for the store, Patrick's musical tastes come into question.
Relationships: Patrick Brewer/David Rose
Comments: 8
Kudos: 138





	and i've been meaning to tell you

**Author's Note:**

> I don't know why this happened, but its here now. A lot like folklore, I guess.

There’s a girl. A young girl. Early-twenties with a trendy blunt bob, bangs, and a chunky blue cardigan standing in the center of the store. She’s...cool...in an East Village sort of way.

He grimaces at his psyche's use of the word  _ cool  _ before he greets her.

“Hi. How can I help you?”

“I saw your Instagram post that you’re hiring? I’m Ellie,” she says, and he just notices she’s holding a sleek black folder. 

Patrick will love that she’s brought a folder.

“Oh. Great. I’m David, nice to meet you.” 

They shake hands, and by now Patrick’s drifted from the back room, probably having overheard what the girl was here for.

They exchange introductions just as she and David had and Ellie taps a finger against her folder.

“I can just leave my resume and you can get in touch if you’re interested?” she offers politely. She has a nice smile. 

“Sure. Are you in school, Ellie?” Patrick asks, taking the folder and flipping it open.

“Yes, at Elmdale College. Just to get my basics out of the way,” she’s quick to add. “I’m a business major with a focus in retail management.”

David watches Patrick’s faint eyebrows tick upwards. Cartoon hearts may as well be springing from his eyes and an ethereal, inoriginate spotlight shining down upon this girl. David tries not to roll his eyes. Good naturedly, of course.

“I also included a proposal for a business model similar to yours for a mock company I created in my Foundations of Entrepreneurship class,” Ellie says.

She should sound like an overbearing know-it-all, but he knows now how to recognize this type. She’s just...nice. She’s smart. She cares.

He shoulders into the Business Nerd Circle.

“Very impressive,” he says. “Tell me, have you lived in Schitt’s Creek your whole life?” 

She nods. “I mean...how ever unfortunate that may sound.”

Patrick huffs a laugh. David smirks.

“But I’m thinking about University of Toronto next fall.”

“Mm. Great school. Great weed,” David nods.

Patrick’s gaze falls to him with gentle disapproval.

Ellie grins secretly.

“You have a really beautiful complexion. Obviously you have a very practiced skincare routine. There’s a few other things we need to know though. No wrong answer here. This is purely just to get to know you. Who would you consider the ultimate queen of pop?”

“Taylor, of course.”

“Oh, absolutely.” Patrick grins.

It’s professional to keep a neutral expression during these sorts of things, and David would like to think he tried, rather than blinking owlishly at his husband, honestly a little thrown at his ready agreement.

“When’s the earliest you can start?” Patrick asks. David frowns now, letting his brows knit together. He glances quickly between them, befuddled.

“Oh, I could start as early as Monday.”

“Let’s say Monday at noon so I can show you the books. Tuesday can be your first full day, if that works for you.”

“Great.”

Necessary information is exchanged, and they’re both left grinning, David leaning near the lip balms, Patrick behind the counter.

David looks up at him and waits.

“Some things tumble into place, huh? I really like her,” Patrick says.

“Do you mean Taylor, or…?”

Patrick pushes away from the counter with his hip, throws him an easy smile before disappearing into the back once more.

-

“So… Taylor?”

Patrick looks up from where he’s stirring at the stove. A smile flashes over his cute little mouth and David has to scrunch his up to keep the glee from taking over. 

“Her music’s great.”

“Hm. I wouldn’t know.”

“You’ve never heard a Taylor Swift song?!” 

“Shock and awe from someone who had never heard a Mariah song until three years ago!”

“OK, David, I  _ had  _ heard a Mariah song at some point in my life before. She’s ubiquitous.”

“And would you also say that about Taylor?” David asks.

From his spot at the island, he can see Patrick’s head shaking. Shaking at David’s antics. He sips his wine, coolly smug. He smacks his lips, once, just a little, just to let Patrick know he’s enjoying his choice in cabernet.

“Would you consider her like… in the hall of fame of gay icons, is all I want to know?” he presses on, grinning. 

Patrick laughs, pushes the vegetables out of their pan.

“For me, I guess. Maybe not anybody else.”

“Oh, no, no. I think she’s great. I mean… she’s… she’s… prolific. Her body of work is…”

“You don’t have to like everything I like, David.”

“Oh no, and I don’t.” 

Patrick looks over, faint brows ticked up, teasing, inciting. 

“It's just that I’m trying to reconcile the fact that I never knew this about my  _ husband  _ until he was already my husband, and it's just… shocking. For you. And interesting. And... cute.” David twists his hands, voice getting smaller and smaller as he ticks off adjectives.

He knows this feeling now. Its endearment. Affection. It's gross, but with Patrick, it's sweet, comfortable territory.

Patrick leans over and kisses the corner of his smiling mouth. “Your  _ fixation _ is cute. Here.” He thrusts a plated serving of seared salmon and veggies into David’s hands, passes through to the dining room with his own plate. David follows.

“I’m not fixating, It's just not very often you… you know… care about celebrities, beyond Niel Young and Joni Mitchell, so this entire thing is just very interesting.”

“Let’s eat, David,” Patrick says, and David decides to bury the issue for the time being.

-

“OK, I have to ask,” he bursts, letting his paperback fall against his chest that night in bed. “Do you think she’s like…?”

Patrick takes his time retrieving his bookmark from the nightstand, tucking it in place, shifting so his head is pillowed on his arm. He blinks up at David with taunting patience. “Do I think she’s what, David?”

“You know… Like do you think she’s pretty?”

“Do you think Mariah Carey is pretty?”

“Um. Gorgeous. Stunning. Perfection.”

Patrick breathes a laugh.

“She is the type of girl I would’ve dated, yes,” he admits, then pauses. David worries this whole silly scheme will take a turn for the dark, if the sad shift in Patrick’s expression is anything to go on, but then Patric’s mouth quirks, his soft lashes fluttering mischievously. “If she was in my league at all, I guess.”

“Mm. Without the seaside houses and hordes of screaming fans, you mean.”

“Right.” Patrick’s voice is a little rough, but he’s still grinning. David traces the seam of his sleep shirt, over his sturdy shoulder.

“I liked her curly hair.” Patrick finally lands on something David can bite, and the glint in his eyes says he knows David will.

“Oh, the  _ curly  _ hair! It was the  _ curly _ hair you liked, then.”

“The bob with the bangs was cute too,” he says, offhand, then makes a happy little show of retrieving his book, placing his bookmark carefully at the back cover, fluffing his pillows. He gives pause, looks up at the ceiling, sweet pale skin that Daivd just wants to kiss, all on display. “The curls are just so… classic. So of their time, you know?” he breathes with mock passion.

“Oh my God, you’re  _ obsessed _ !” David shouts.

“I’m trying to read, David. It's almost bedtime.”

“Oh. Oh I hope so.”

David shimmies back down under the blankets, props his book on his chest and goes about finishing the current chapter he was on. He doesn’t comprehend much, too busy smiling at the pages.

“I mean I just wonder…” he says after a moment. “If it’s weird that I’ve met like half of her boyfriends.”

Patrick set his book aside this time, loud and definitive against the nightstand.

“Hang on.” He twists in the sheets to sit up, blinking down at David while he peeks innocently from behind the pages. “David. Are you mad you never met  _ Taylor Swift _ ?”

“I’m not  _ mad!  _ I just… She’s very strict about her privacy. And that’s great for her!” David blusters. Patrick smirks knowingly, and David’s caught. “She  _ did attend _ a few of the same parties as me but… we have never officially met, no.”

“So the whole thing here is that I’ve surprised you with a celebrity crush, you want to nettle all the details out of me but you’re bothered because you’re the one who’s got the repertoire of celebrity stories, just none about the one person we happen to be discussing. Is that where what all this is about?”

David grins, still hiding behind his paperback. “Well I’ve never met Tina either,” he says, letting his eyes roll while he shakes his head.

Patrick twists around now, arching over David and he gives into the easy, almost instinctive tangle of limbs.

“You’re much better than Taylor. And I’ll tell you why.”

“Go on,” David chirps, fingers brushing up Patrick’s side, scrunching up his shirt. 

“I never saw you coming.” Something in Patrick’s expression glints. “And I’ll never be the same.” 

David grimaces. “What are you saying to me? Are you…? Oh. No, we won’t be quoting Taylor Swift lyrics to each other, that’s ok though.” He gives his husband’s shoulder a pat.

“You made a rebel of a careless man’s careful daughter.”

“I’m frightened now.”

But Patrick cards a hand through his hair, kisses his cheek. “You are the best thing that’s ever been mine.”

Then he’s quiet, lavishing affection to David’s neck, his shoulders, and David slips into the moment, loses the thread.

-

“...and then you put the total sales for the day here. The sheet already has all the formulas in place to give you the revenue here…”

“Oh, ok, so you just basically plug in the numbers from the point of sale report.”

Patrick smiles and nods. “Yeah. Hey, you’re a quick learner. You hear that, David? All you have to is plug in the numbers from the point of sale report.”

David looks over from the candles he’s laying out, ruler in hand. “The sales report, right.”

Ellie stifles a laugh.

“Great,” David says, loud, a hand flying out to land on his hip. “Now I have two people to laugh at my expense. This is fun for me.”

“Three, technically.” Patrick shrugs. “But, Stevie’s out of town this week, so…”

David gives a sigh, goes back to his candle straightening.

They treat—if it can be called a  _ treat,  _ honestly—Ellie to lunch, and the afternoon wears on long and weary as they busy themselves with showing her the ropes, drafting up a schedule, pouring through old documents.

David’s the good kind of tired once they lock up. He’s learned to appreciate it, somehow or other. This serene sense of a day well spent. He’s gazing through the big picture windows of their shop while Patrick twists his key in the lock, Ellie already gone for the evening down the dusky sidewalk.

“What are you smiling at?” Patrick asks lightly, kissing his cheek as he passes to lead them to the car.

“Just looking at our store. We did that. You and me. Well mostly me,” David teases, ducking in when Patrick holds the car door open for him. 

He’s gone then, for a second, before he reappears at the driver’s side.

“Mostly you? Was it you who secured the startup capital, then?” Patrick buckles his seatbelt. 

“Now we have a whole employee. We've done it. We’ve successfully built a retail empire.”

Patrick laughs and reaches to cover David’s hand with his own. “That’s something to be proud of.”

David grins, happy and full. “You should play some Taylor.”

Patrick’s wide eyes gleam. “Ooh. Are you trying to seduce me?” 

“I’d just like to hear what all the hype is.”

“I don’t think you’re ready for it, David. We have to set the mood.”

“Ok, wait are we talking about music or me seducing you? Because I’d be open to either one, I’d just like to know which.”

Patrick leans across to kiss him. “The aesthetics.”

David lingers in his space. “Ooh you know I love it when you use that word.”

“When you introduced me to Mariah, you insisted we go through her entire discography in order. Same thing stands for Taylor. You can’t just listen to a few songs on the way home and expect to get the whole experience.”

“Ok, fine. I guess you’re right. So Mariah now, seducing you later?”

Patrick grins and passes the aux cord.

-

Something strange happens a few months later. 

A surprise announcement sends both Patrick and Ellie into histrionics of Rose family proportion.

The vinyl for the eighth studio album arrives on their doorstep in mid-August, and David loses Patrick to the upright piano in the parlor. It starts with just plucking out the notes, playing along with the needle. As the days pass, he adds in chords, and a private sort of hum David isn’t sure he’s supposed to hear. 

He drinks lots of tea. A lot more than usual. Ellie wears a different cardigan every day for two weeks. In the dead of summer. David hears her dreamy humming when she thinks she’s alone on the sales floor. Patrick smiles while he spritzes the plants.

David eyes the both of them suspiciously, quietly floats around them. Takes the time to smooth out his tone more than he normally would care to. 

Patrick doesn’t have many eccentricities. Isn’t particular about much. Not nearly as long of a list as David, anyways. But he protects his instruments and his music collection like children. On a rare afternoon alone, when Patrick’s gone on a last minute bank run, David thinks maybe just this once, it’d be ok. 

He fishes through the thick stack of records, sets the needle in place—careful just like Patrick showed him—and lets the music drift through the house.

-

The routine they’ve carved out goes along on its own, through the end of summer and into the telltale signs of fall. Work, quiet nights alone, some nights a little louder with friends and wine and flowing conversation, where David gets to see Patrick’s big happy smile out for everyone to see. A few new contracts, long drives out along picket fences and stretches of blue sky to big red barns and handshakes. Baskets and jars and fresh-scented soap tied with twine and handcrafted with care. 

“I love you,” David says, outright and outloud, on the sidewalk on the way to the cafe for dinner. It's cold enough now that they have to wear coats. No gloves yet. Just the warmth of their hands held tight between them.

Just the warmth of surprise sentiments that make Patrick’s ears blush pink, even now.

“And you know, sometimes I wonder,” he goes on, even as they reach the cafe, even as Patrick holds the door, “if there really was an invisible string tying you to me.”

Patrick stops, blinks. Then his lips quirk in quiet realization. David looks just long enough to see his keen, shrewd smile, before he passes inside.


End file.
